During the 2004 presidential campaign, Sen. John Kerry explained his vote against a supplemental appropriation for military operations in Iraq and Afghanistan by saying, “I actually did vote for the $87 billion, before I voted against it.” It cemented the impression of Kerry as a hopeless flip-flopper.

More recently, Mitt Romney aide Erik Fehrnstrom explained how his candidate could win the GOP nomination over his more conservative foes and still attract moderate voters in the general election. “It's almost like an Etch-a-Sketch,” Fehrnstrom said. “You can kind of shake it up, and we start all over again.” It confirmed, second-hand, the perception of many conservatives that Romney lacks a political core.

Then there is Barack Obama. In an unguarded moment four years ago, he showed his disdain for Americans who cling to guns or religion. He has repeatedly expressed his frustration that “our Founders designed a system that makes it more difficult to bring about change than I would like sometimes.”

If only the president didn't have to explain his policies to the ignorant masses. If only he were unconstrained by a system of constitutional checks and balances and didn't need to worry about the approval of Congress or the Supreme Court. A president who harbored such sentiments might whisper to the leader of another nation, and not exactly a friendly one, “This is my last election. After my election, I have more flexibility.”

When an open microphone caught this candid exchange with Russian President Dmitry Medvedev last week, it authenticated fears about how extreme an Obama presidency unmoored from electoral accountability might be. Obama and Medvedev were discussing a NATO missile-defense system based in Central Europe intended to guard against the prospective threat from Iranian and North Korean missiles as well as rogue or accidental launches.

Russian cold warriors view the system as an encroachment on their nation's sovereignty. In Poland and Romania where the interceptors and radar installations eventually would be based, citizens have fresh memories of Russians trampling on their sovereignty. For Obama, who is still pressing the reset button with Russia and accepts as an article of faith that missile defense is offensive, cutting the program is a painless way to trim the defense budget.

It was in this context that Obama confided in Medvedev, asking him to relay to Russian Prime Minister and President-elect Vladimir Putin that he needed some space to take care of the missile defense problem. Obamabots immediately tried to spin the president's comments into some brilliant diplomatic commentary about election-year politics. But the truth of the gaffe is in the clarity of the words he wasn't supposed to say.

Obama wasn't talking to Medvedev about how elections influence American policies. He was talking about how his policies would be free from influence after the American elections. “This is my last election. After my election I have more flexibility.”

To whom else, beyond the reach of microphones, has President Obama pledged his flexibility during a second term in office? And about what other issues, foreign and domestic?

As a lame duck, what would a president do who has already strained relations with historic allies, who has run up more debt faster than any predecessor, who has expanded government spending to unprecedented levels and who has threatened to institute a cap-and-trade program under which he said — in another gaffe — “electricity rates would necessarily skyrocket”? If the election gives President Obama the flexibility that comes with retirement, the American people won't have to find out.